BBC Leadership

Julian Lewis Excerpts

Tuesday 11th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Lisa Nandy]

I am happy to give my hon. Friend that assurance. We are looking both at the charter process and at how we can help to support and defend local news through the BBC’s work. She will also know that this Government are developing a local news strategy to help our local newspapers to survive and thrive in an era in which they face significant pressure. She is absolutely right to say that local news is not just about reflecting the whole nation, although it does play that essential role; it is also often the training ground for some of our most talented journalists, who would otherwise not get those opportunities, so we are determined to strengthen and protect it.

[Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

I would fight in the last ditch to prevent the BBC from ceasing to be a public service broadcaster and from being broken up. Any large organisation can have bad actors who behave unethically, and that has happened on this occasion, but it does the BBC no service when people parrot the line that the person responsible for this crisis is not the idiot who tampered with Donald Trump’s quote but a former Tory spin doctor, one of 13 members of the board, who allegedly influenced other members of the board to somehow provoke the present crisis. The crisis has nothing to do with Robbie Gibb; it has something to do with a mindset that, on the front page of today’s Guardian, has the whole thing about Robbie Gibb and relegates the fact that a $1 billion lawsuit may be taken out by Donald Trump against the BBC to a tiny paragraph at the end of the article on page 2. If you wants to know what is wrong with some bits of the BBC, read The Guardian today.

[Lisa Nandy]

I am not entirely sure how to respond to that, but the right hon. Member’s views are now on the record.